The Plan (The Hillers of Barratt County #4)

Chapter 20

20

Ronnie had not gone home.

And… well… she had ended up sleeping in his master bedroom. George just hadn’t been in there with her. He’d been on the couch, sprawled like a giant man-creature, when she’d gotten up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. She vaguely recalled falling asleep on that couch, and vaguely remembered strong arms carrying her, then being lowered to a bed, and someone kissing her on the mouth and telling her to sleep.

That he was going to take better care of her from now on. She’d felt warm, comfortable, safe… and loved. Damn it. What was he doing to her here?

He had carried her to his bed and just put her there. Talk about making a woman feel a little gooey and off-center here. He could have just left her on that couch with a blanket. She’d have been just fine.

But she was still there at Georgie’s castle now. She’d even showered in that master bathroom, trying to ignore the scent of George everywhere around her. He’d even had clothes for her to change into. Yes, they were Giavonna’s sweatpants and T- shirt that she’d apparently left at her brother’s, but… they were clean clothes that fit well. Nice and comfy. She suspected he was feeling all good and proud at being able to provide for her today.

And she just hadn’t been in a hurry to go home. They still had baby daddy details to discuss, after all. Now she sat on his front porch with his collection of paint sample swatches. He’d given her a task—to keep her occupied. While he and his beautiful bevvy of brothers did the hard stuff—like stripping all that wicked wallpaper down.

Uh-oh.

Brothers. George wasn’t the only one with brothers.

The sound was loud, that was what had her automatically looking. She froze. A not-very-nice word came out before she could stop it. This was going to be trouble. She had known they would find her, but she’d hoped it would be one brother. Not… all three.

Cam and Murdoch usually sent Anthony to talk to her when they were serious—apparently Anthony was the best one at communicating with rabid little sisters and everything. The sweetheart. They knew better than to gang up on Ronnie—she’d trained them on that fact years ago.

But… that wasn’t just Murdoch's truck roaring up Second Street. Ronnie's fingers dug into the porch railing of George's house. Cam and Anthony pulled in behind him. Three "big-man" trucks she’d accused them of using to compensate for other things before were right there now. Red, black, and blue.

And taking up space.

They blocked the driveway. George’s truck, the two his brothers had arrived in—the Hiller boys weren’t going anywhere. Not until her brothers had their say.

Her stomach rolled, and not from morning sickness. This was going to be a fiasco.

She knew with one look that they were Lakes-on-a-mission.

Ronnie was their mission.

Oh, she loved those idiot baboons. But she really wished they’d go on an extended vacation right now. “Great. They’ve found me.”

A door slammed across the street. Mrs. Sandoval dropped her pruning shears. Her four incredibly hot, very well-built sons were right there, repairing their parents’ porch roof after last night’s storm. Lamar stepped closer to the fence, just watching. His brother Luis, an elementary school teacher with the broadest shoulders of any man she had ever seen, stepped up next to him. The other two brothers—she didn’t remember their names—were on the porch, arms crossed over rather impressive-man chests. Everyone was waiting.

Watching. Her brothers had taken up the entire street when they’d come roaring down—both sides—for a reason.

That whole Rescue Ronnie Mission and everything.

“Honey, go back inside. I can deal with them, if you want.” George's hand touched her back.

She jumped. She hadn’t expected him to be so close. Her Georgie-radar must be broken today. “No. If I leave you out here alone, they will probably gnaw through the front door to get to me. They can be a bit determined, my pet baboons.”

“Who are they?” his brother Gene asked, all rumbly next to Ronnie’s left side. Like he was trying to protect her from the triple blond threat coming their way.

“That would be Snarly, Scooby, and Shaggy,” George said, all quiet and determined. Intense. She had heard him like that before. “They are here to take her away from me. I think it may be a matter of their brother-pride.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Gene said. “It’s a matter of our brother-pride.”

Oh, he was so cute in his caveman ways, this one. And… if Ronnie wanted to go with her brothers, Ronnie would go with her brothers. George was going to have to learn that she made her own decisions just fine. She’d also probably have to train the Hiller brothers on that little fact, too. But her blond baboons seemed to have forgotten their training lately.

She knew it with the way they were crossing the driveway now. Her work was never really done, was it?

"Step away from her, Hiller." Murdoch crossed the grass.

"Not happening, Lake,” George said in the exact same tone.

Oh, hell. No they weren’t. They just weren’t.

"Like hell it's not. Ronnie, get in my truck. I’m taking you back to Mom’s.” Murdoch looked at her like he meant to just scoop her up and carry her back to the castle.

Oh, she pitied the woman this one married someday. Murdoch seriously seemed to think he was in charge here.

When, whether the boys all liked it or not, Ronnie seemed to be the star player.

And... whether she liked it or not, either.

Everyone was staring at her. Waiting for what she was going to say to that. Back to her mother’s, when her parents didn’t even know they were going to be grandparents yet. Um… no. That was not a scene she wanted to play in. She just… couldn’t handle it if they didn’t care about the alien-baby, either. She wanted them to love the baby as much as she did—and there were no guarantees they’d even… notice.

"No. Murdoch Michael, I am staying right where I am at. For now. Georgie and I have things to work out. You guys will not be fighting with Georgie.” She crossed her arms over her chest and blocked them. What were they going to do—move her out of the way? They were far too scared of her to do something that stupid.

“I have no intention of fighting with your precious Georgie,” Murdoch said in his most annoying tone. He was really good at being annoying, this one. “We just want to discuss how he thinks he can just grab our little sister off the street."

“He didn’t just grab me off the street.” Well, in a way he had. She’d started walking home from the grocery store—like she had before, many times—and he’d just scooped her up and kissed her, put her in his truck, and driven away with her.

Right by where Murdoch had been parked across the street.

It surprised her it had taken Murdoch, Cam, and Anthony this long to find her, actually. George’s house wasn’t hard to find at all. Of course, they’d probably spent most of last night arguing amongst themselves about what to do about this situation. Well, Murdoch would have made demands and threats, Anthony would have tried to calm his twin, and Cam—well… with Camden Lake, nothing was ever predictable. She’d given up trying years ago.

But they loved her. That was something she had never doubted.

“Your sister is old enough to make her own decisions,” George just had to say.

Well, she had told George that yesterday, as he was stuffing her into his truck. “So you remember that when it’s convenient for you, Georgiano Maxwell?”

She just couldn’t let that pass.

“I always remember that. I just want to be your choice now.” Oh, he was looking at her that way again. The way that just meant trouble. He pulled her closer, kissed her right on her mouth, and nudged her toward his youngest brother. Next thing she knew, she was behind a tall Hiller twin boy’s back. And George was stepping off the porch, all puffed up and confrontational. “She’s staying here with me.”

Oh, this was definitely not going to go well.

Murdoch stepped right up to him, and tried to go around him. What was her brother doing? Was he going to slug it out to get to her? He was a cop, for heaven’s sake. He could lose his job for being so stupid.

Someone was going to have to take charge here.

"Don't be idiots! You are all too old for this!” she said.

But Gunn shifted right into her path, so protectively. “You’d probably better stay back. I don’t think this is going to be pretty.”

No kidding.

Gene moved fast, after all.

He grabbed Murdoch’s shoulder. “Get lost.”

That was all it took. She would never know who threw the first punch—Gunn was rather tall, and hard to look around. But she knew… she had heard that particular sound so many times before.

Bodies hit grass.

Cam went for Grady—but just to pull him off of Murdoch’s back, she thought. Anthony circled left, saying words Ronnie didn’t even know her sweetheart of a big brother even knew. Anthony almost body-checked Guthrie. That one made Ronnie stare for a second. Cam and Murdoch, yes—they could be a pair of monkey butt idiots—but Anthony?

"Sweet mother of—" Mrs. Sandoval said from across the street. Loud enough for Ronnie to hear. Her sons were cheering—and Ronnie thought she heard them making bets.

Gene tackled Murdoch off his brother. They crashed through the old roses right there in front of the porch. There was George. On the ground. Why was Georgie on the ground?

No.

That wasn’t going to happen. Her brothers were not going to clobber George. She just wasn’t having that. He had a baby on the way to support, for heaven’s sake.

Gene and Grady sat on Murdoch. They just… sat on him.

But her brother was still swinging. Kicking, too. And Murdoch had really long legs.

She looked over at the one man she thought would be reasonable—besides Gunn, anyway. Anthony was holding the most George-like of the Hiller brothers—Guthrie—back. But it wasn’t easy for her brother. They were pretty well-matched, those two. And they were wrestling against each other, locked in some weird guy competition. They almost looked like they were enjoying themselves.

Where was Cam?

Her eldest brother just stood there, blood dripping down his face from a scratch on his forehead. He looked at her as he touched the scratch. “Rosebush got me. You want me to stop this?”

“Well, yes, ding-dong. I do.”

“I thought so when you just yelled ‘Don’t you dare hurt Georgie, you idiots!’ Three times, you yelled it three times. So I decided to back off. Not hurt your precious little Georgie. But you know how Murdoch is.” Cam just shrugged and turned to Anthony. “Let that one go. We’ll rescue Murdoch in a minute. Maybe. I’m really having fun watching this, honestly.”

Anthony immediately turned to Guthrie and held out a hand to him. “How have you been, Hiller?”

“Good, you? I’m at BCGH under Lewis for an internship in obstetrics now.”

“Switched to trauma med recently. Hard to get into the program, but it feels right.” And then Guthrie and Anthony just stood there, talking as if they were old friends. Well.

While Gene kept sitting on Murdoch.

To her brother’s credit, Grady was now off of Murdoch’s legs, gasping for air in the grass as he rolled around.

Oh. Poor Grady. He was clutching himself. Well… Murdoch had gotten in one good hit, apparently.

"You done?" Gene's voice was hard. Blood dripped from his lip. She almost thought that one had enjoyed the battle or something. A bit more primitive, that Hiller brother.

Murdoch's answer was another swing. And that word again.

Her brother never did know when to give up. Especially when he was protecting someone he loved. He could be such a tenderhearted butthead, Murdoch Michael Lake.

She hoped the woman stuck with him for life was prepared for that. She’d need nerves of steel, that was for sure.

And a phenomenal sense of humor. And tolerance.

“All right, Murdoch. You have proven your point. You are the only one still acting like a baboon. Stop it right now.” Ronnie stood right next to her middle brother. “Right now.”

He finally stood up. He was filthy and bloody and just looked pitiful. But she understood—he wanted to protect her. The way he thought he hadn’t been there to protect Celia so long ago.

She loved this baboon. So much. “I love you guys. All three of you. But this is not how you solve problems.”

“Ronnie… hell. He just took you. And didn’t bring you back.”

“I know. And you were rescuing me. He is very good at kissing me senseless, then putting me in his truck before I get my brains back. It is a new problem I seem to have. Maybe not allowing him to kiss me anywhere near his truck is the best solution? But… you can’t just scoop me up and take me to Mom’s just because that’s what you want, either. George and I have made a baby. We have things to figure out. That will require us spending time together discussing things. George is also going to start listening to me and behaving in a way that a prominent member of Value society should.” She shot the father of her alien-baby a glare. One that said she meant it and he’d better pay attention. “You should know better. You are the eldest of all of these doofuses. You are about to be a father. I expect better out of you.”

A police siren cut off the rest of her lecture.

Maybe someone with some sense had arrived.

The sheriff’s department cruiser rolled up, all flashing lights. Deputy Wyatt Ward got out. Her stomach sank. Any deputy but this one…

“I got a call from the Hiller girls. Apparently, there was a brawl going on in their brother’s front lawn.” Deputy Ward just looked at her. He had that stupid smirk in his eyes again. She’d always despised this man. Every time their paths crossed. “Hello, Ronnie. How are you doing today, honey?”

Honey ? Grr. She was not his honey. If she was anyone’s honey, that would be George. Considering.

“I have had better mornings, Deputy Ward. Far better.” This was the one deputy in the county she did not like. He just… was oily. And she did not like the way he looked at her sometimes at all.

Then another car pulled in. And three beautiful teenage girls climbed out.

Genny was the first to reach them. “What happened? Who are these dudes? Is everyone okay?”

“What are you three doing here?” Grady asked. “You should be at home, doing homework or something.”

“It’s summer break, doofus. We got out of school Friday. You should pay attention to what goes on in your own house.” Genny shot her brother a look Ronnie had probably just shot at her own baboons. “What’s happening? Who are these guys?”

“Boys—these are George’s little sisters. Giavonna—she’s a student at FCU, Genny and Greer.” Greer’s hair was purple today. And was that a fake nose ring?—and those black clothes had to be hot. Teenagers were so weird. “These are my brothers, girls. Cam is the oldest and thinks he’s in charge, Murdoch is the one with a bad attitude—he’s the bloody, muddy one. And Anthony is the good one. Usually. They were here to rescue me from Georgie. As you can see, it didn’t go well. For any of them.”

And Deputy Ward obviously recognized Murdoch. “Officer Lake, what kind of trouble you getting into now? Looks like you lost.”

Oh, she did not like the way that man was smirking at her brother. Not at all. Like he wanted to just cause Murdoch trouble here.

“He’s a cop?” Gene asked. “Shit.”

“Gene, do not curse in front of your sisters.” Ronnie shot him a glare. He could do better. She had met his mother, after all.

“He does it all the time. He was born in a barn,” Genny said. “And… your brothers are wicked hot. I suddenly think I like blond guys more than anything in the world.”

“Genesis Isabella!” Grady gasped out, looking like he was about to clutch the pearls again there at the idea. “Don’t say that!”

“But they are really super hot. So how old are they? Do they like younger women?” Greer asked. “Gia is nineteen… she’s an adult now and can date older guys if she wants.”

“And can find her own guys to date, thank you very much. Besides—" Giavonna shot a pointed look at Cam and Murdoch and Anthony. Dismissively. “I don’t like guys who punch first, talk last. It’s totally against my religion.”

“Sorry, darling. I was just supervising, anyway. I just… got hit by a spare elbow when I went to rescue Georgie-poo from Murdoch and the rose bush got me. That’s all. I am Camden Lake, the man of your dreams.” Cam bowed to her, a flirtatious grin on his beautiful face. Cam always flirted with the girls—no matter the age. He was really good at it, too. “Do you like older men? How about FBI agents? I am one of those, too. Big and strong and heroic.”

“Hero complex? So I see. And totally not interested.” Giavonna just smirked at him. This girl knew how to handle herself, no denying that.

Deputy Ward stiffened next to her. He shot Cam an appraising look that had the hair rising on Ronnie’s arms. “What field office?”

“Dallas. I currently work corruption and human trafficking cases, mostly.” Cam held out a hand to Deputy Ward. “Ronnie is my precious baby sister, obviously. Though we look nothing alike.”

Baloney. She greatly favored her brothers—except her eyes were a blueish gray and her brothers’ eyes were all their father’s mix between blue and green that all the girls just sighed over annoyingly.

Cam turned to Giavonna. “So… how do you feel about taking lonely FBI agents to dinner at the diner tonight? I will kick Anthony back home to his new bride. He’s just so boring now as an old married man. And we can just dump Murdoch in the reservoir on the way when we drive by. He’s a bit muddy and everything. Needs his monthly bath. I will even take your sisters as chaperones. You can tell me all about how wonderful Georgie is! Please?”

He smiled again. Giavonna’s cheeks turned bright red. So she wasn’t completely immune. Interesting.

“Not ever going to happen.” Grady almost growled it.

Ronnie half thought he was going to get started again. Murdoch’s knee had apparently gotten him square on. Grady looked a bit beyond cranky right now—and ready to protect his sisters from Ronnie’s dastardly brothers. Brother-pride. She just shook her head.

“No one is going anywhere,” Ronnie told them all. “Except Deputy Ward. Deputy, as you can see, this was just a case of boys acting like boys and not men. Now, we are remodeling George’s house today. Every pair of hands is needed to get this done. So… boys… all of you… march. There is wallpaper to be stripped. Cam… quit flirting with Giavonna, or her brothers will clean your clock next. Or she might, anyway. She’s a little scarier and tougher than they are, I suspect.”

Well, they were all just standing around, with plenty of energy to spare. So… her brothers were tall men, too. That wallpaper was beyond stuck. What else was she going to do with all of them today?

It was time to get to work.

"Need me to file a report, honey?” Deputy Ward sidled closer. She forced herself to stay right where she was. This man… ick. He had no business near her, George’s sisters, or the rest of her family. Or George’s.

"What's to report? Just some men acting foolish. Apparently, my brothers have a problem with my relationship with George. I’m sure you understand. Nothing worth writing down."

"Yes ma'am." He headed for his cruiser. "Though next time, might want to take it inside. Half of Value just saw that family squabble.”

“We’re cheap entertainment,” Cam called after him. “Nice to meet you, Deputy Ward. I’m sure we’ll meet up again.”

Murdoch was on his feet now. “I seriously hate that guy. Worthless piece of?—"

Ronnie glared and looked toward the younger teenagers. It was enough. She pulled Genny up on the porch behind her. Genny was just chattering away at Anthony—and Guthrie—about her plans to go to the nursing program at FCU someday.

Mrs. Sandoval herded her sons toward their house. "Dios mío, wait until your father—" The rest dissolved into Spanish that made her boys—every last one of them older than Ronnie—wince. She had no doubt all of Value was going to know what happened here today by noon.

Good thing her parents lived in Barrattville. And well… didn’t pay any attention to what their daughters were doing, anyway.

She touched her still-flat stomach. At least their child was going to have seven overprotective baboon uncles and a father who'd just proven he could match any of them for sheer stubborn protectiveness.

Or idiocy.

She wasn’t sure which.

God help them all.